


In The Leaves

by the_never_was



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: AwkwardBoners, Drarry, Fun, Humor, M/M, One Shot, Prophecy, Romance, semi-fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-29
Updated: 2017-12-29
Packaged: 2019-02-23 18:38:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,309
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13196175
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/the_never_was/pseuds/the_never_was
Summary: Sexy glares, tea cups of prophecy, and awkward, ill timed erections--the hallmarks of an uncomfortable Hogwarts teenage experience.





	In The Leaves

**Author's Note:**

> Fun little one shot.  
> Working on more serious stuff at the moment, and thought to post this in the lull while I could get a mobile hotspot.  
> Waiting on WiFi installation is killing me, folks.  
> Happy late holidays.
> 
>  
> 
> Characters/Harry Potter universe belong to JK Rowling.

 

 

 

 

 

Divination. What a fucking waste of a class.

Draco Malfoy sits trapped alongside a mixture of other third years in a hot room at the top of a tower, all with a professor who strikes him as a woman several galleons short of a proper Gringotts account.

“Professor Trelawney,” a Hufflepuff politely calls from his far left, hand in the air.

Draco rolls his eyes, elbowing Zabini next to him as the bastard starts to drift off. If _he_ can't fall asleep in this hot, ridiculous room, then Blaise isn't about to do so _either_.

Blaise sends him an annoyed glare, an arched brow, and an elbow back while the Hufflepuff asks her question with a soft tone, “On holiday I met a witch who read tea leaves, and I thought of our previous class. But she did something different.”

“And what would that be, my dear?” Trelawney asks, eyes magnified behind her giant glasses. Honestly, the woman always appears to be a sentient mass of wiry hair, robes, and eyes. Terrifying.

The Hufflepuff glances about shyly when she notices the rest of the students focus on her curiously, and she mumbles, “She read leaves that were supposed to reveal something about one's true love.”

Oh, Merlin.

Draco snorts with Blaise, both of them shaking their heads along with every other Slytherin in the room. The Ravenclaws seem curiously skeptical, the Hufflepuffs are all watching the girl helpfully, and the Gryffindors are a mixture of teasing one another and glaring at the Slytherins.

Harry Potter, of course, is glaring at him with his sharp green eyes.

Draco glares back, smirking as Potter turns it into a staring contest.

Like every prior instance of it happening, Draco feels the heat sizzle between them, and some part of his mind wonders how _no one else_ does. It's as if the bloody rooms have gone up another few degrees of temperature already, and Draco holds his sneer perfectly, bouncing his brows up and down twice until Potter gets a shoulder jerk from Weasley, who merely scowls towards the Slytherins.

Stupid Weasel interrupting important things for stupid classwork that is entirely pointless.

Potter's eyes flare his way one last time before they turn away, and Draco revels in it, the heat now inside of him curled about his spine and pooling into his belly in a way it has begun to do since the start of term.

“Thought you might have hit your quota earlier this morning for nagging Potter,” Zabini drawls under his breath, looking ahead as Trelawney grabs for a large pot and some supplies from a cabinet.

Draco flushes and eyes his nails distractedly.

So what if he'd managed to go out of his way after breakfast to trip Potter in the hall, and so what if that's why Potter is _still_ managing to sneak little glares since?

So what if Potter had caught himself falling as Draco had expected of the athlete, rolling for a moment and bending with his robes shifted to the side for Draco to see something he's been growing more and more curious about each passing day?

So what if Potter's arse is somehow beyond captivating and he's unable to not notice it now?

“Yes, well, apparently his quota for me isn't full yet,” Draco mumbles, looking forward as well as Trelawney rights herself and nearly chokes on her own large scarf when shutting a cabinet door.

It's easy to tell that Potter is staring at him. He knows because the left half of his face feels on _fire_ in the fucking roasting room.

“You know what I think?” Blaise begins, dark eyes slyly glancing out their corners to Draco.

Draco narrows his gaze on his friend. “No, and I _don't_ want to know.”

Blaise crosses his arms, grins awfully, and mutters only for him to hear, “I think you two should just get a fucking _room_ and snog already.”

For a moment his entire face reddens; he can feel every bit of his skin flush, can feel his mouth open in shock and his eyes widen in panic that the very deep, worrisome thoughts he's been having manifest into his dreams lately about Potter have somehow made themselves known.

“Have something to insinuate, do you, Zabini?” Draco questions, hoping to throw his friend off while Trelawney finishes setting up some display with everything she's gathered despite continuously babbling to the Hufflepuff.

Blaise laughs lowly to himself. “I'm _beyond_ insinuation, Draco.”

“Shut _up_ , you pompous prick,” Draco hisses dramatically, his insides going topsy-turvy.

“I swear, it's like he _knows_ we're talking about him. He's staring at you...like _really_ staring at you,” Blaise teases, looking over Draco's head as Draco refuses to turn his face to follow.

He believes Zabini. His fucking face is _sweating_ above his brow.

Draco says nothing, hoping Blaise will drop the subject, but his friend snickers and whispers, “Five galleons says he wants you.”

“Fuck off,” Draco whispers back harshly.

But his heart is pounding, and his mind is running with the possibilities all on its own. Images of Potter shoving him into a wall for a kiss, of himself grabbing Harry's bum quickly while smacking into him during quidditch on brooms, and of them snogging in the Slytherin team room rock through his brain, and Draco's eyes grow large as he feels something else on his body swell, too.

Oh _shit_. Not here. Not here, not anywhere.

He carefully adjusts, pretending to be bored, and makes sure his robes cover his front where he's possibly visible and panicking over it.

Trelawney summons a Ravenclaw down to try the tea, explaining to the class that this kind of reading involves special teas and special symbols that can be difficult to decipher as they're related to a specific person tied to the viewer.

Draco rolls his eyes, still feeling the heat in his cheeks, and he can't help but wonder for a single moment just what Potter's cup might tell him. Despite its chances being utter shit at likely being real, it is still a strangely melancholic thought to imagine some girl in Potter's future, and his face falls slightly.

“Cheer up, mate. He's staring again. You know, I never noticed how much he does it. Always thought it was _you_ unable to look away and covering it up with arguments. You're both honestly pathetic, regardless of rivalry or _whatever_ it is.”

Draco kicks Zabini's foot in silent retort, melancholy gone and the red in his face back on high.

Blaise looks far too pleased with himself sitting there, and Goyle and Crabbe glance down the row their way as Draco turns to give him a small glare of awareness.

And as Trelawney's voice swells, signaling he should pay attention, Draco takes two more seconds to look Potter's way. His mouth drops open slightly when he catches Potter staring at him oddly; the idiot blinks when their eyes meet, and then he immediately turns away, rosier through the cheeks for some reason.

It's not the same redness that sometimes shows itself when Draco gets Potter too riled up.

It's...different.

More like...like his own face, still red from Zabini's snark.

Draco taps his fingers upon the desk, wondering just what the bloody hell _that_ might mean, when he hears Trelawney repeat herself and gaze his way.

“Volunteers? Come now, your section is very engaging at times. Ms. Parkinson, would you care to try the special leaves?”

“As if they'll be more than a clump of crap for her,” Crabbe mutters under his breath, and Pansy shakes her head, getting Trelawney's attention off of her before Draco watches Pansy jerk Crabbe by the ear and bark something horrible into it.

Draco feels Zabini grow uncomfortable next to him as the professor's gaze continues to move along the Slytherin crowd. The only positive effect of her doing so is the discomfort has entirely spooked away whatever was in his system, and his embarrassment has softened, making him silently grateful for it.

“Mr. Malfoy,” Trelawney speaks his name, and Draco sighs, attempting to look unimpressed and unmoved. “Would you care to volunteer?”

“Of course he would,” Blaise says for him, more pleasant and mannered than the bastard's ever sounded in his fucking life.

Draco stomps Blaise's foot as he hears Weasley's snickers from among several Gryffindors chuckling lowly, and he turns, noticing that the professor is smiling at him and gesturing for him to step on down to her table at the front.

Merlin, how embarrassing.

He rolls his eyes, but stands and moves to the aisle between the sections. Grey eyes dart down to his side where Potter is sitting a few seats inside to his left, and the green there isn't glaring like usual but is staring oddly again. Almost as if curious.

Unnerved entirely by that, Draco sneers over the Gryffindor lot and steps down to Trelawney's location, turning just enough away from her to make a rude hand gesture towards Zabini and hearing an amused scoff as a result.

“Very well, Mr. Malfoy. Have a seat. I will have you pour and drink your tea in a moment.”

Draco collapses into the chair opposite hers, well aware of _every_ pair of bloody eyes upon him at once. His face thankfully isn't so warm now, even though he knows Potter is staring, too, because he's far too annoyed to even be down here to care about people eyeballing him.

Trelawney waves her hand over the table as she finishes her preparation, smiling at him. “Now, go ahead. And remember, think well. Concentrate. Imagine a tie of energy from you to someone out in the world, a tie of destiny and love, and wish for a symbol associated with them to appear for you now.”

Draco hears the words hissed from a few of the Gryffindors that make the rest cackle, and Finnigan and Weasley laugh over a drawing Finnigan holds up that displays a crudely drawn critter of some type. Something possibly ferret for some reason.

He huffs and looks away, then lifts the pot and pours the tea. One sniff tells him it's nasty stuff, and Draco scrunches his face, but takes a sip and then another. His eyes close as he decides to ignore the rest of the room, and he actually finds himself doing as the professor suggests without meaning to do so as the magic of the tea works: Draco tunes everyone out for a moment and just imagines himself in a vastness of space and time, and something inside of him reaches out, feeling a pulse. He grabs it in his mind, pulling it like a string, fascinated by the warmth and humored loving feeling it gives off.

And then he opens his eyes as he swallows the last bit of tea and sits the cup down.

Everyone collectively holds their breath, including Draco and Trelawney.

He doesn't dare look at first, because even if he doesn't believe it to be worth anything, there's just that slim chance it _might_ have meaning.

The professor brushes her unruly hair from her face and stares him down with her magnified owlish eyes. “Are you ready to look?”

“Must I?” he flatly asks, attitude back and covering him.

“Well, but of course!” she hoots.

“Unless you're afraid it's literally _empty_. You know, because there's _no one_ possibly out there who'd love you,” someone mumbles between the Slytherin and Gryffindor sections while he's staring at the cup.

“Hush now,” Trelawney murmurs, clearly not hearing the words that have Draco gritting his teeth.

Just out of spite, he reaches for the cup. He hears the gasp of the room, smirks, and with a steadied breath dips the top to peer inside.

For a moment all he sees are random clumps, and he is strangely left disappointed.

But then his eyes focus, and it's there. A single symbol made out of the bits of tea.

Draco goes pale and then red. Very, very red. Redder than before when Blaise was such a shit.

“Bloody hell, it must really be something,” someone catcalls from the Ravenclaw section.

Draco barely hears a Hufflepuff shush the Ravenclaw. It's as if he can't move. He certainly can't put the cup down, and he absolutely cannot tear his eyes away from its contents.

His fucking brain is paranoid. His ridiculous heart is hopeful. And his eager young body is already curious and excited, stirring again and making him desperately uncomfortable at the very thoughts.

That is until Trelawney herself takes the cup from his almost gnarled fingers, gasps politely and calls out loudly, “Ah! How interesting. A lightning bolt.”

Whispers and rumbles of sound immediately erupt in the room, and Draco at first refuses to look at the one pair of eyes he can _feel_ upon him more than any other.

“Well, whoever your love is out there, I imagine they've got quite the _electric_ personality. But you must be careful, Mr. Malfoy. Lightning is as destructive as it is empowering. Be cautious with your love, but unafraid. Embrace their wildness and enfold yourself into their energy with trust,” Trelawney predicts across from him, sitting his cup down and clapping her hands. “Another volunteer?”

Draco instantly stands, fighting the looks and gushing around him, and he pauses at the base of the small steps when he hears a single voice speak above the rest.

“I'll try,” Potter says quite firmly.

The look is burning between them, and Draco fights the little tremble down his body as new whispers start up about the two of them staring as they are. A single Ravenclaw mutters something pertaining to the word “scar,” and Draco tries not to twitch with anxiety while people begin to make connections he's already made and begun to panic over.

Draco waits until Potter steps all the way down, refusing to get closer to him if possible. But when Potter does pass by and Draco takes the steps right after him, the energy around Potter is as thrumming, as _electrical_ as the damn scar on his forehead that has Draco paralyzed in his spot next to a _widely_ smirking Zabini. It's always felt that way around Potter, though, hasn't it? Maybe he drank too much of that strange tea.

“This is fantastic. What a day,” Blaise sighs, sounding very amused indeed.

Draco isn't having any of it. “I hate you. Get down there and drink your _own_ cup of that awful shit.”

“My, my. _Someone's_ afraid of a lightning bolt, no?”

“Am not,” Draco spits, grey eyes solely focused upon Potter as he begins pouring his own cup down below. “Like any of that is real.”

Everyone grows quiet, even Crabbe and Goyle with their bickering over a small cake they'd sneaked out of the Great Hall, and Draco watches, body burning with nerves, as Potter's strong, handsome throat swallows down the tea.

How he manages to make drinking fucking tea into something sensual, Draco doesn't know, but Potter manages to do it perfectly. Draco's teeth gnash his lower lip, his fingers grip the desk, and he feels himself harden a bit again, terrified but unable to do a damn thing about it.

Potter finishes the tea and holds the cup slightly away from himself. But he takes a split second to glance about the room before looking down, and the green eyes bore into Draco more in that moment of time than they often do upon meeting.

Draco holds his breath, heart lurching bizarrely in his chest. He ignores everyone else around him, doesn't hear the soft discussions of curiosity, just zones in upon Potter's face as he watches Potter stare into his now empty cup.

The green eyes widen, grow puzzled, and then soften.

And as she did with Draco, Trelawney takes Potter's cup away from him to look inside and state her prophetic words. But Potter isn't watching her do it. He isn't paying attention to anyone but Draco himself, staring back up with intensity that has Draco's body hardening even more to the point of real worry.

“Fascinating! Mr. Potter has a dragon. Such a rare symbol, you know, but it is one of raw power focused by the dragon's control and cleverness. You've a handful here, Mr. Potter, and my advice to you is to be respectful of the dragon by seeing all the little parts of it—the magnificent fire, the scales, the wings and the hidden, protected heart. Dragons are such misunderstood creatures with their temperaments. Don't fret if your love is a bit covetous of you; it is a protective trait too often mistaken for selfishness.”

Draco blinks once at the uncomfortably bare description while the rest of the class talks about it. He feels a few eyes from the Gryffindor and Ravenclaw sections upon him, and as Potter walks back up the stairs to swap with another Hufflepuff student, Draco swallows roughly and pretends to look away, not noticing him rising closer.

“You know, real or not, I think that look was _all_ want from him,” Blaise begins quietly next to him as they hear the Hufflepuff drink a bit loudly. “You owe me five galleons, _Dragon_.”

“Shove off,” Draco growls back, legs crossing awkwardly at the ankles beneath the desk as he wills his stupid body to cool _down_.

The bells chime, and Trelawney finishes with the last student while Draco takes his time gathering his things, hoping it'll help reduce chances of anyone bothering him or noticing his slowly vanishing problem. All he can _think about_ is that stupid cup of Potter's and Potter's eyes and a lightning bolt-shaped scar, and it is _not_ helping.

Blaise only smirks and cuffs his shoulder as he leaves, and Draco tells Goyle and Crabbe to go on without him, moving slowly down after another crowd from the far left of the room to funnel out together.

Draco slows his walk, mind going faster than his broom in the wind as he tries desperately not to cling to what he's just seen and heard. It's meaningless, and it's barely magic at all. Trelawney's full of it, and her vision of the Grim in Potter's cup a while back was entertaining enough for him to pretend to believe and rile Potter up with it.

He doesn't expect anyone to be standing near the steps up.

He definitely doesn't expect it to be Potter.

Draco's mouth goes dry as Potter looks him over once with some sort of knowledge in his eyes. He stammers back together with a roughly thrown out, “What are _you_ waiting for?”

“You, Malfoy,” Potter drawls, a brow arched.

“Why, Potter?” Draco questions, entirely skeptical even as his heart races with excitement.

Harry Potter only smirks handsomely with confidence that both rattles and emboldens Draco and says, “Just trying to be respectful to you, you misunderstood, covetous lizard.”

Lips open, rounding as Draco becomes speechless.

Before he can throw Potter off by telling him lightning could represent _anyone_ and not just him with his bloody scar, Potter winks at him and murmurs, striding away, “Oh, and Malfoy? Next time you want to stare at my bum, just do it. I'd rather not have to constantly repair my glasses from you tripping me each time.”

“You...! I _do not._ ” Draco stares after him, surprised and defensive.

But it hits him that Potter's clearly not _disgusted_ about it, not even perturbed by the cups in class either, and then he smirks, follows Potter on down, and speeds past, risking _everything_ with a fast reach.

Potter's loud gasp in the hall behind him makes the entire morning and anything yet to come worth it while Draco sighs to himself, striding happily away with his robes thankfully covering the awareness of just _how nice_ that bum of Potter's really is.

 

  
  
  


 


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